Music icon Peter Green helped form one of the greatest rock bands in the world, otherwise known as Fleetwood Mac.
Rolling Stone magazine ranked him at number 58 in its all-time list of the 100 greatest guitarists, describing him as “Britain’s most progressive blues guitarist” in his heyday.
He preferred to play slowly to express the emotion in his songs, rather than show off his speed, saying: “I like to play slowly and feel every note.”
B.B. King once said: “He has the sweetest tone I ever heard,” and added, “He was the only one who gave me the cold sweats.”
Early beginnings
(Image: Getty Images)
Peter was born October 29, 1946, in London and began playing guitar from an early age, teaching himself by age 11.
In his teens he was in plenty of bands including Shotgun Express, a Motown-style soul band featuring a young Rod Stewart.
In Christmas 1965 Green was playing lead guitar in Peter Bardens’ band Peter B’s Looners, where he met drummer Mick Fleetwood.
He had the opportunity fill in for Eric Clapton in John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers and soon became a full-time member of the band.
Peter made his recording debut with the Bluesbreakers in 1966 on the album, A Hard Road, which featured two of his own compositions, The Same Way and The Supernatural.
He was so talented that his musician pals labelled him The Green God and he soon left the Bluebreakers to start his own blues band.
Fleetwood Mac
(Image: Michael Ochs Archives)
In 1966 Peter set up a session with the Bluesbreakers’ rhythm section: Mick Fleetwood on drums and John McVie on bass.
The recordings included an instrumental named Fleetwood Mac.
In 1968 they released their debut album titled Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac in Britain and Fleetwood Mac in the United States, and it gained widespread acclaim and reached number four in the charts.
Peter wrote the instantly recognisable instrumental track Albatross, which remains the band’s only number one hit, plus two other early hits, Black Magic Woman and Oh Well.
Peter led Fleetwood Mac for less than three years, from 1967 to 1970, and left the group before it became one of the world’s best-selling bands in the late 1970s.
He said: “I want to change my whole life, really, because I don’t want to be at all a part of the conditioned world, and as much as possible, I am getting out of it.”
Illness
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In 1978 he married a Canadian fiddle player, Jane Samuels, who he then divorced in 1979.
They had a daughter together, Rosebud Samuels-Greenbaum.
But while he was still with Fleetwood Mac, his bandmates soon noticed a change in Peter’s state of mind.
He was taking large doses of LSD, grew a beard and began to wear robes and a crucifix.
Peter was found to have schizophrenia in the 1970s.
He underwent electroconvulsive therapy and was in and out of mental hospitals.
Speaking to the BBC in 2017, Mick Fleetwood said he wished he’d spotted the signs of Green’s illness sooner.
“I wish we had been better equipped,” he said “Maybe we could have seen something that could’ve helped – not to keep him in the band, but to help this person through the beginnings of a very emotional ride that, really, he’s still on as we speak.
“It affected his life in a very dramatic way,” he adds. “I don’t think he was treated right for what turned out to be his illness, but he’s healthy now and doing ok.”
Re-emergence
(Image: BBC)
Peter re-emerged in 1996 with the Peter Green Splinter Group, which mostly played old blues and songs written by its other guitarist, Nigel Watson.
The group released eight albums before disbanding in 2004.
In 1998, Mr. Green was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Fleetwood Mac.
In 2009, Mr. Green toured Europe with a band called Peter Green and Friends.
Death
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Peter passed away on July 25, 2020, in his sleep aged 73 years old.
He is survived by his daughter, Rosebud.
A statement released on behalf of his family said: “It is with great sadness that the family of Peter Green announce his death this weekend, peacefully in his sleep.”
He goes down as one of the most influential blues rock guitarists, regularly cited as one of the greatest of all time.
A year before his death Mick Fleetwood held a star-studded concert for his friend, accompanied by Pete Townshend, Noel Gallagher, Neil Finn, Steven Tyler and John Mayall.
“I wanted people to know that I did not form this band – Peter Green did,” Mick told Rolling Stone. “And I wanted to celebrate those early years of Fleetwood Mac, which started this massive ball that went down the road over the last 50 years.”
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
